An allergy is an abnormal, adverse physical reaction of the body to certain substances known as allergens.These substances can be toxic (exhaust fumes, petrochemicals) or nontoxic (such as foods or pollens) and allergy sufferers will react to quantities that are harmless to most people.

When exposed to allergens, allergic individuals develop an excess of an antibody called immunoglobulin (IgE). The IgE antibodies react with allergens to release histamine and other chemicals from cell tissues that produce various allergic symptoms. In other words, the immune system mistakenly identifies harmless substances as dangerous invaders and activates antibodies to defend the body.

What is an intolerance or hypersensitivity?

Part of the difficulty in determining the number of allergy sufferers there are lies in how broadly or narrowly one defines the term. Medical doctors often support a narrow definition, asserting that the only true allergies result from activation of IgE antibodies. Millions of people, however, experience allergic reactions without the antibody reactions.These people are said to have an intolerance or hypersensitivity to particular substances. Although the cause may differ, the diagnosis and treatment often overlap.Thus, scratch tests and RAST tests for allergies are generally not useful for people with intolerances.

How does Food intolerance affect your health?

Food is intimately linked to your body's immune system.The underlying cause of immune system dysfunction is poor digestion and allergies.When the body doesn't digest food properly, because of an allergy or sensitivity to a food, the undigested food is absorbed into the bloodstream, and the immune system targets it as a foreign invader and starts attacking it. This antigen, antibody response creates circulating immune complexes (CICs), which can inhibit certain immune system backup mechanisms from functioning and ultimately causing autoimmune problems. In autoimmune disorders, such as MS, thyroiditis, lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, chronic fatigue syndrome or ME, the immune system has lost its ability to distinguish between "self" and "not self", and the body starts attacking its own tissues as if they were antigens. When the CICs lodge in different parts of the body, the immune system attempts to destroy them, and in doing so, destroys its own healthy cells.

In other words, if you are regularly eating foods you are allergic or intolerant to, you are continually placing your immune system under stress, leaving you more susceptible to illness. By permanently desensitizing the foods you are allergic/intolerant to, through NAET allergy elimination treatments, you enable your immune system to do the job it was intended to do- protect you from illness.

Immune system disorders of all types respond amazingly well to NAET, and can lead patients back on the road to recovery and optimum health.

Cutler E.W Winning the War against Immune Disorders and Allergies (1998) Delmar Publishers